Dandelion root coffee

 I'm obviously a glutton for punishment, making all these weird coffees when there's perfectly good teas out there! Anyway, Dandelion root coffee is made in pretty much the same way as most other coffees.. 

The root is cleaned and chopped and ready to be roasted 

Again I pan roast rather than oven roast as it gives me more control over the roasting process and I can get the root to the exact condition I need it to be in to make the coffee.

This is a handy wee contraption, it's a spice grinder and it's a handy thing to take into the woods where you might have difficulty in finding a socket to plug your coffee grinder into! Small, simple to use and one fill of it makes about 2 cups of coffee.

Into the strainer and let it infuse for about 3 minutes.

Very dark, quite a coffee like smell and a sort of coffee taste but highly bitter, something that might be better with milk and sugar. As for me, I'll stick with a mint, linden and balsam fir tea.

Chicory root coffee

 Now as you know I'm not a coffee drinker but it is useful to experiment with foraged plants to see what uses they have, chicory is one of them, we all know its a coffee substitute but is wild chicory different than shop bought?

5 minutes picked enough roots to use

Chopped and ready for roasting, in the oven for about 45 minutes till dry and slightly golden brown

Fully roasted and into the blender

Once blended it was mixed with hot water, allowed to infuse for 3 or 4 minutes then poured through a coffee filter

We then tried it black and it was ok though a little bitter so the addition of some milk and a spoonfull of sugar made it quite acceptable, nothing like shop bought chicory coffee at all and more like a malted drink like horlicks. I think I'd still prefer tea but in an emergency situation I think most people would find it quite acceptable and certainly more palatable than shop bought.

We beat Ray Mears!

 Feedspot have just released their 'best UK blogs of 2022' and we were very happy to be amongst the best, as a matter of fact we came in as the 6th best in the UK, however we did steal a wee bit of glory as Ray Mears came in as 7th! All good fun.

 

Better luck next time Ray!